The 80-million-year-old dinosaur fossils found by chance on a highway in São Paulo

Dinosaur fossils were found during the duplication work on the BR-153 highway, at kilometer 85, in Mirassol, in the interior of São Paulo, over the weekend. The suspicion is that the material found is from a titanosaur, a species that lived in the Cretaceous period, known as the final period of the “Age of dinosaurs”, 80 million years ago.

According to paleontologists, a femur fragment of about 80 centimeters, a humerus (foreleg bone), a caudal vertebra and a dinosaur tooth were found. The fragments were about ten meters deep and took approximately ten hours to extract.

“They were in a ravine that was being excavated. Because they are close, we believe they all belong to the same animal, with the exception of the tooth, which was found 30 meters away from the others”, says paleontologist William Nava, responsible for the Museum of Paleontology de Marília, who helped in the work of removing the fossils.

The fragments were taken to the Pedro Candolo Museum of Paleontology, in Uchoa, also in the interior of São Paulo, so that paleontologists can research the species of the fossil. The analysis work should last around one year.

“We started to prepare the fossils, which is the total removal of the block of rock where they are inserted, so we will have full access to the bones to identify their characteristics. After that, we compare them with other fossils of the same group and so we see if it is a known species or even a new species”, explains Fabiano Vidoi Iori, a paleontologist at the Pedro Candolo Museum.

Still, according to paleontologists, the fossils most likely belong to the group of titanosaurs Sauropods – quadrupeds, with long necks, herbivores and that lived predominantly in South America. These animals would have been approximately 12 to 15 meters long, and weighed between 10 and 15 tons.

The date

A first fossil was found by employees of the Triunfo Transbrasiliana concessionaire, responsible for the duplication works on the BR-153, in the interior of São Paulo.

During the excavation of a ravine, 15 days ago, the workers became suspicious of a whitish rock and sought information from paleontologists in the region.

“Initially, they thought it was a mineral formation. I asked them to send me pictures so I could analyze it, and I soon realized that it was a dinosaur fossil”, recalls Nava.

The site has been isolated and preserved. ANM (National Mining Agency) and Ibama (Brazilian Institute for the Environment) were notified of the discovery and a task force was set up last Saturday to remove the material.

“It’s a meticulous and time-consuming job because we need to preserve as much of the fossil as possible and also be careful because it was a ravine area. When we excavated the rock found by the workers, we soon came across two more fossil fragments. Despite the depth, they were very deep. well preserved,” adds Nava.

In addition to the paleontologists, engineers from the concessionaire that works on the highway and the Federal Highway Police also accompanied the excavations, to ensure the safety of the specialists working on the site.

Importance

For paleontologists, the historical findings are important to help design the scenario in which these animals lived millions of years ago in the interior of the State of São Paulo – an area where fossils are very common.

“Studies on the region’s paleofauna have been expanding a lot, as well as the discovery of new fossiliferous sites. A finding like this not only expands the area of ​​occurrence of titanosaur materials in the region, but also allows us to better understand the diversity of this group and how it interacted with the other animals already discovered in our region”, adds Iori.

Other discoveries

This is not the first time that workers have found dinosaur fossils during duplication works on São Paulo highways.

In October last year, parts of the femur and rib of a dinosaur that lived at least 65 million years ago were found on the Rachid Rayes Highway (SP-333), at km-341, in Marília (SP). The fossil was found at a depth of five meters and was located by employees of Entrevias Concessionária de Rodovias, while they were digging a slope on the side of the road.

Four months earlier, the duplication work on the Dona Leonor Mendes de Barros Highway (SP-333), on the border between Marília and Júlio Mesquita, in the interior of São Paulo, had to be stopped after workers found a fossil of a titanosaur leg.

Already this year, researchers discovered a new species of dwarf dinosaur that lived in the region of São José do Rio Preto, also in the interior of São Paulo. Called Ibirania parva, a titanosaur from the sauropod group, five to six meters long and herbivorous. It was considered the first dwarf dinosaur from the Americas.

The discovery came from work carried out since 1999 and published in the international scientific journal Ameghiniana.

Also in September 2022, researchers published in the same magazine the discovery of an unprecedented species of frog that lived with dinosaurs, 90 million years ago. The fossils were discovered during the duplication work on the Comendador Pedro Monteleone highway (SP-351), in 2011.

This text was published here.